Modern European
8 Porchester Gardens, Bayswater, London W2 4DB
Latest critic review: January 20, 2011
British dining in Whiteleys
From reknowned chef Rowley Leigh, Le Cafe Anglais is his latest venture following stints at Le Gavroche, Le Poulbot and his own Kensington Place. Situated in Whiteley's shopping centre, the art deco stylings of Le Cafe Anglais offers a wide range of French and European food, suitable for everyone, and is one of the restaurants in London that will offer grouse after the Glorious Twelfth.
Critic Reviews
Chris Pople Cheese & Biscuits
Reviewed on January 20, 2011
"...I bear no grudge to Rowley, who is obviously a very talented chef and runs a very successful restaurant (even this huge space was full last night), I just wish my meal had lived up to the size of the room, menu and price tag." READ REVIEW
Hermano Primero Dos Hermanos
Reviewed on December 12, 2010
"Skirt Steak (Bavette) came as four bloody chunks and was full of good beefy flavour. A Béarnaise was textbook as were a bowl of hot, crisp frites." READ REVIEW
Dos Hermanos Dos Hermanos
Reviewed on August 16, 2009
"You can currently get Grouse at several several London restaurants...But for eating it in one of London's nicest rooms and with good service and a great atmosphere to boot it's hard to beat Le Cafe Anglais." READ REVIEW
"The bistro classic, skirt steak with shallots, also had an enjoyably dilute red wine sauce, a sign of Leigh's determination to cook not blockbusters but the kind of food you'd love to eat every day, if only you could. Rabbit with escarole and bacon salad from the rotisserie was wonderfully tender and sweet, too." READ REVIEW
Jay Rayner Observer
Reviewed on January 20, 2008
"I want to go back, and often. Rowley Leigh has written a menu designed for eating from, and I intend to meet the challenge." READ REVIEW
"...this was a memorably good meal, enhanced by such pleasingly retrograde puds as a coffee and vanilla sundae with chocolate sauce, and we waddled away agreeing that Leigh has surpassed even himself with a restaurant that is wonderfully well designed to delight and satisfy, rather than to intimidate and impress." READ REVIEW
Marina O'Loughlin Metro
Reviewed on January 02, 2008
"...pleasures wane with main courses. I ask for another starter because the promised roast goose with apple sauce has just sold out. Gnocchi – actually a single Roman-style polenta gnocco, to be pedantic – with overcooked chicken livers and a not entirely welcome free gift of chicken hearts is no consolation." READ REVIEW
Giles Coren Times
Reviewed on December 29, 2007
"...I’ve been a couple of times now and I think it is well worth fussing over. The menu is big but controlled, a guide in itself to the evening Rowley thinks you should have: at the top, some aperitifs, then some hors d’oeuvres, then the starters, fish, roasts, vegetables, pudding, carriages. " READ REVIEW
Terry Durack
Independent
Reviewed on December 16, 2007
"There is a lot to like at Le Caff above all, the idea of a restaurant essentially drawn up and driven by a home-grown chef with intelligence and integrity. But it still has a way to go, needing more time to come to grips with the vagaries of the rotisserie, and to bed down its staff." READ REVIEW
AA Gill Sunday Times
Reviewed on December 09, 2007
"Le Café Anglais is a room and a menu that make promises the kitchen isn’t keeping. Too much misses its own mark." READ REVIEW
Anon Time Out
Reviewed on December 05, 2007
"Ingredients are first-rate: the wafer-thin smoked eel in a starter salad with bacon was the best we’ve ever had." READ REVIEW
Mark Bolland ES Magazine
Reviewed on December 03, 2008
"Assignation? The tables are much too close together for anything risqué and illicit. And anyway, with a menu like this, who could be bothered with romance? It has the most interesting and original combinations of food I've seen in ages and choosing what not to have was more taxing than Alistair Darling." READ REVIEW
"Eating here is like being a member of a club, but one where everyone is made to feel welcome. Or perhaps it's more the case that because everyone is made to feel welcome it feels like you're in an exclusive club." READ REVIEW
"Richard & Peter" Harden's
Reviewed by November 27, 2007
"But enough carping. The key point about this bright and already-busy brasserie is that the food is invariably good, and sometimes very good – all the more of an achievement, as the menu is large and quite diverse." READ REVIEW
"What a strange place the Café Anglais is: both cool and scorchingly hot, the menu wide-ranging but very narrow in the main courses, the service super-attentive then forgetful." READ REVIEW
Larushka Ivan-Zadeh London Lite
Reviewed on November 21, 2007
"As we glided out into the shopping hell, my friend said how it all suddenly felt as surreal as The Truman Show. Yes, I agreed, except everything at Le Café Anglais really was as good as it gets." READ REVIEW
"The roasts may be the centrepiece but the rest of the assiduously well-composed menu is a delight and a tribute not only to experience but also wide reading and an appreciation of that special love some English have for France - an affair captivatingly described in Elizabeth David's French Provincial Cooking." READ REVIEW
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More Details
Price: - Moderate
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Modern European
Address 8 Porchester Gardens, Bayswater, London W2 4DB
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